The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb — Volume 2 eBook

to this class of sufferings may in part account for
this. The animal tribe in particular he taketh
under his especial protection. A broken-winded
or spur-galled horse is sure to find an advocate in
him. An over-loaded ass is his client for ever.
He is the apostle to the brute kind—­the
never-failing friend of those who have none to care
for them. The contemplation of a lobster boiled,
or eels skinned alive, will wring him so, that
“all for pity he could die.” It will
take the savour from his palate, and the rest from
his pillow, for days and nights. With the intense
feeling of Thomas Clarkson, he wanted only the steadiness
of pursuit, and unity of purpose, of that “true
yolk-fellow with Time,” to have effected as
much for the Animal, as he hath done
for the Negro Creation. But my uncontrollable
cousin is but imperfectly formed for purposes which
demand co-operation. He cannot wait. His
amelioration-plans must be ripened in a day.
For this reason he has cut but an equivocal figure
in benevolent societies, and combinations for the alleviation
of human sufferings. His zeal constantly makes
him to outrun, and put out, his coadjutors. He
thinks of relieving,—­while they think of
debating. He was black-balled out of a society
for the Relief of **********, because the fervor of
his humanity toiled beyond the formal apprehension,
and creeping processes, of his associates. I shall
always consider this distinction as a patent of nobility
in the Elia family! Do I mention these seeming
inconsistencies to smile at, or upbraid, my unique
cousin? Marry, heaven, and all good manners, and
the understanding that should be between kinsfolk,
forbid!—­With all the strangenesses of this
strangest of the Elias—­I would not
have him in one jot or tittle other than he is; neither
would I barter or exchange my wild kinsman for the
most exact, regular, and everyway consistent kinsman
breathing.

In my next, reader, I may perhaps give you some account
of my cousin Bridget—­if you are not already
surfeited with cousins—­and take you by
the hand, if you are willing to go with us, on an excursion
which we made a summer or two since, in search of
more cousins—­

Through the green plains of pleasant Hertfordshire.

MACKERY END, IN HERTFORDSHIRE

Bridget Elia has been my housekeeper for many a long
year. I have obligations to Bridget, extending
beyond the period of memory. We house together,
old bachelor and maid, in a sort of double singleness;
with such tolerable comfort, upon the whole, that I,
for one, find in myself no sort of disposition to
go out upon the mountains, with the rash king’s
offspring, to bewail my celibacy. We agree pretty
well in our tastes and habits—­yet so, as
“with a difference.” We are generally
in harmony, with occasional bickerings—­as
it should be among near relations. Our sympathies
are rather understood, than expressed; and once, upon